Platonic Pathways: Selected Papers from the Fourteenth Annual Conference of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies

book reviews 87

John F. Finamore and Danielle A. Layne (eds.), Platonic Pathways: Selected Papers from the Fourteenth Annual Conference of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies. Frome, United Kingdom: Prometheus Trust, 2018. Pp. 304. ISBN 9781898910879. £14.

This anthology, published under the title Platonic Pathways, contains a col- lection of short papers presented at the 14th annual conference of the International Neoplatonic Society on June 15-18, 2016. The selection of papers deals with a variety of topics that all relate to Platonism broadly conceived. After two initial papers on Plato himself, the rest of the book covers different aspects of the Platonic tradition, ranging from Plotinus to later Neoplatonists and Christian authors, even as far as the modern writers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Philip K. Dick. Since I will not be able to do justice to all sixteen papers within the limits of this review, I will focus on a selection of them and examine these contributions more closely. In ‘The Significance of Initiation Rituals in Plato’s Meno’, M. Ross Romero convincingly argues that the dramatic detail of Meno leaving the city before initiation (Meno 76e) has a bearing on the overall meaning of the dialogue. This approach certainly deserves consideration: although often treated as irrel- evant for the philosophical significance of the text, dramatic details often con- vey a deeper meaning that should be taken into account for an understanding of the dialogue’s philosophical purpose. M. Ross Romero then investigates the role of initiation in the Meno against the background of what we actually know about mystery cults in the ancient world. Since the Platonic dialogues are full of references to initiation into mysteries, this contribution is very illuminating in view of the obscure nature of ancient mystery cults. In ‘Plato’s Timaean Psychology’, John Finamore considers the difficult issue of how to make sense of the apparently different views on the soul found in Plato’s dialogues. Finamore rightly argues that in the Timaeus Plato presents the tripartite conception of the soul as a temporary arrangement for embodied souls, while sharply contrasting the embodied soul with the purely ratio- nal soul that is immortal. After a clear discussion of Plato’s psychology in the Timaeus, Finamore attempts to show the incompatibility of the doctrines of the Timaeus with those of the Republic and the Phaedrus, arguing that Plato “has, in fact, changed his mind” (p. 16). Although the discussions of the soul in these dialogues show some undeniable differences, one can have some res- ervations about the strong claim that these earlier dialogues and the Timaeus are completely incompatible. In fact, there are reasons to believe that also in the Phaedrus and the Republic (specifically book X) Plato connects the soul’s immortality to a certain form of rationality, just as he does in the Timaeus.

Considering that Plato’s views on the soul are far from clear, Finamore’s contribution invites further discussion on this controversial issue. On the basis of linguistic theories on the Greek verb ‘einai’, Paul DiRado and Michael Wiitala (‘In What Sense Does the One Exist? Existence and Hypostasis in Plotinus’) try to correct a common misunderstanding about Plotinus’ views on the existence of the One. Their investigation heavily depends on a 2004 paper by Charles Kahn, who argued that for the Greeks, it is not the existential use of ‘einai’ that is primary, but the predicative function. Kahn’s contention, therefore, is that Plotinus’ belief that the One is beyond Being does not mean that the One does not exist, but only that it cannot be an object of predication. The authors’ own contribution consists of a philological discussion of the word hypostasis leading to the conclusion that for Plotinus hypostasis is not equiva- lent to our modern univocal notion of existence. For this reason, the question as to whether the One exists in the modern sense of the word is completely be- side the point. The great value of this paper lies in the authors’ recognition of the importance of philological and linguistic research in gaining a clear philosophical understanding of Plotinus’ text. The discussion of Neoplatonic first principles continues in the paper ‘Peritrope in Damascius as the Apparatus of Speculative Ontology’ by Tyler Tritten. According to Tritten, Damascius’ skepticism concerning the first prin- ciple is ontological rather than epistemological since it “does not result in igno- rance, but it is a way of affirming a knowledge about the non-predicability of the Ineffable” (p. 185). This claim is problematic because it seems to undermine the very purpose of Damascius’ skeptical attitude. As Tritten himself emphasizes, Damascius’ skepticism is based on the idea that the Ineffable is completely ir- reducible to conceptuality and thus to thinkability and predicability. For this reason, it is hard to believe that Damascius’ skepticism is meant to lead to any kind of objective knowledge about the Ineffable, including an affirmation of its non-predicability. Rather, his skeptical attitude is grounded in the awareness of the fact that the Ineffable is beyond the reach of our language and knowledge. The Ineffable’s ineffability can only be embraced through mystical experience. In one of the final contributions ‘Philosophy and Commentary: Evaluating Simplicius on the Presocratics’, Bethany Parsons investigates the question why Simplicius makes so many verbatim references to the Presocratics. She ex- plores three possible explanations which are clearly not on a par, considering that the third one, the harmonization thesis, is by far “the most substantial ave- nue of explanation” (p. 236). For this reason, it is a pity that Parsons did not de- vote a larger amount of her contribution to explore the influence of Simplicius’ harmonizing strategy on his references to Presocratic philosophers, maybe at the expense of some other passages. Moreover, in her brief discussion of the

The International Journal of the Platonic Tradition 14 (2020) 65-108